Sofa c. 1953

Ernest Busenbark made this watercolour painting of a sofa, sometime between 1855 and 1955. What strikes me is the process of looking here. The light blue of the upholstery is cool, calm, and collected. The rendering here is so precise, especially where Busenbark shows us the wood grain. Look at the light reflecting off the curve of the sofa base. I see a kind of quiet attention in how the blue meets the dark wood trim, and how the thin white line separates the two. The details make it work. That line, a delicate thread of white, loops around the curves of the sofa, defining its form. It's not just a line; it's a decision, a moment of focus that brings the whole piece together. I can’t help but think of another obsessive artist here, say Agnes Martin, and her commitment to line. But while Martin's lines are about pure space, Busenbark's line defines the edge of a real thing; a beautiful, blue sofa. It all adds up to something ambiguous, and beautiful.